More than 80 years ago a young girl had a chance encounter with one of Goulburn's first female journalists. The encounter only lasted a few minutes but the memory stayed with Fay Bressington over the years.
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Now 88 years old, she is searching for information about this moment in time.
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Ms Bressington sent a letter to the Goulburn Post on January 4 inquiring about the woman who was captured in her mind.
In the letter, she recalled walking down Auburn Street holding her mother's hand. Ms Bressington didn't recall how old she was at the time, but said she "would have been quite young".
"We stopped to talk to a Miss Bertha Pursehouse who my mother told me wrote the Women's Column for the Goulburn Evening Post," she wrote.
"I would like to think that Bertha's name as an early women's journalist would live on."
The Goulburn Mulwaree Library archives contained an article chronicling the retirement of the journalist. It graced the front page of the paper on December 12, 1944.
The newspaper was very different to what we know today. A the time the Post was four pages long, black and white with text heavy articles crammed together to save space. In 1944 the paper was printed daily.
'Miss Pursehouse retires from staff of post' sat on the same page as news from World War II and a shortage of bottled beer in Goulburn.
According to the article: "Miss Pursehouse has been a friend and confidant of of all the staff at one time or another, and the majority have been on the paper for very considerable periods, but do not know the days when Bertha was not at the office.
"In all the years she had been with the paper she had attended many presentations and farewells, but no one had ever imagined that the day would come when she would be attending her own."
Editor at the time, Mr M H Dart, said "everything Bertha undertook she did well".
"She has at some time or other given us all good advice which, unfortunately, we did not always take."
In the article, Miss Pursehouse said she liked her job and "the people with whom I was working".
"When I look back over the years I have many very pleasant memories of the years when I had the honour of working with the late Mr Harry Pinn and the late Mr T J Hebblewhite.
"Two forceful writers who fought many a political campaign successfully. By their sane outlook and answering principles they had done much towards establishing the reputation of the Post."
She said "the future of the Post was assured while it had people loyal to it."